When The Days Are Cold
by Xcite
Summary: Everyone's getting in the mood of Christmas nowadays. What could possibly ruin the warm and friendly atmosphere? To put it short, a surprise gone wrong.
1. Chapter 1

It was the monsters' first winter on the surface. With December coming to a close, everyone was excited for Christmas and all its hustle and bustle. Except for today, as Frisk and her friends had decided to stay in the house and spend their time together. Frisk was being unproductive watching an anime Alphys had recommended.

"Episode two!" Frisk blurted out just as the episode ended. She stretched on the couch; it had been hours since Alphys and she were being coach potatoes in front of the TV.  
"R-really? I told you'd like it!" Alphys remarked. She tiptoed to the iPod she had attached to the television and loaded another part of the anime to watch.

Halfway through the second episode, Undyne entered the living room with her usual smirk. "Hey punks!" She invited herself next to the two and rested her legs on the coffee table."Watcha watching"?  
"One Punch Man!" Frisk exclaimed.  
Undyne yawned. "Sounds like a bad joke."  
Alphys interrupted, "W-well, it is, actually. Why don't y-you, uhm, join us?"  
Undyne sat up and threw her hands around. "What does this One Punch dude do anyway?"  
"He's a guy who likes to be a hero for fun," Frisk explained which earned her a snort from Undyne, "and he's so overpowered that no one can beat him. He beats everyone up with one punch!"

Undyne seemed interested enough to watch the episode with the two. Violence and knocking people around was right up her alley.  
"You mean this guy?" Undyne pointed at the protagonist. "Hah, _I_ can beat him in one punch! What a wimp! I'm way stronger!" Undyne walked to the television. "Look!"  
"No no no n-"  
 _Crack!_ Went the tv screen. Unfortunately, Undyne's aiming didn't seem to be as good as her punches. Her fist landed right in the middle of the TV, leaving a clean hole in the screen.  
"Oops." Undyne smiled innocently at the two who watched her with mouths agape. "Your TV… didn't seem tough enough for that!"

Alphys and Frisk sighed. "Well, there goes our show." Frisk jumped off the couch and pecked Alphys on the cheek (which made her blush). There wasn't actually anything to worry about; Alphys would whip something up to fix the broken screen. Frisk left the living room as she wanted to know what others were up to.

Her feet took her to Papyrus' room. She knocked gently on the door.  
"COME INSIDE!" Answered his voice on the other side. Frisk pushed the door open and entered. Papyrus was sitting behind his desk. He seemed quite busy with something.

"AH! TINY HANDS! MY WEAKNESS!" The skeleton yelped as Frisk hugged him. He picked her up and put her on his desk. From there, Frisk took a closer look at what her friend was doing.  
Drafts and pieces of paper covered the desk. A bunch of colored pencils and pens lay scattered around. Every now and then, Papyrus would pick one and start scribbling down madly, then read what he had written and eventually crumple the paper and throw it away.

"NYEH HEH HEH! FINALLY, I HAVE COMPOSED THE BEST CHRISTMAS WISH LIST!" Papyrus boasted in victory. "HUMAN, HAVE YOU WRITTEN YOUR LIST FOR THIS YEAR'S CHRISTMAS?"  
Frisk shrugged. "No."  
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, _NO?_ DO YOU NOT WISH TO CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS WITH LOVELY GIFTS FROM SANTA? HERE, YOU CAN WRITE YOURS NOW!"  
Frisk didn't bother telling Papyrus about the whole 'Santa doesn't exist' thing. As long as he was happy, she didn't want to spoil the fun for him.

Not wanting to disappoint him, she nodded happily. Papyrus sat her on his lap and gave her paper and pens to write. Frisk pondered for a moment, and after coming up with what to ask Santa for, she wrote in a sloppy handwriting. After she was done, she gave the letter to Papyrus.

"I'll be taking them to the post office." Said Frisk. She had a little something in mind.  
"ARE YOU SURE, HUMAN? IT IS UNFORGIVABLEY COLD OUTSIDE. THE GREAT PAPYRUS CAN HADLE THIS TASK."  
Frisk nodded. She snatched the papers from the skeleton's gloved hands. "I can do it. I'll be back." Before leaving, she hugged Pap one last time and exited to her room.

Once she was in her room, Frisk put on her winter coat and changed for the rough weather outside; it was snowing and she didn't want to get sick right a week or two before Christmas. Afterwards, she pulled out a tiny safe from under her bed. All the money she had saved throughout the year was inside. She emptied the content and ran downstairs.

Luckily, no one was in the living room. Frisk put her boots on and walked out.  
The town they lived in was quite in the Christmas mood. The streets were lit up with beautiful lights and shops were filled with people. Frisk took the path to the post office but stopped a block away from home. After making sure no one of the family was around, she carefully took Papyrus' envelope out and tore the side.

 _Sorry Pap, but Santa's not getting you anything. I am._ Frisk opened the letter. It was written in capital words, and it was only two or three sentences long. The rest of the paper was filled with decorations.

 _DEAR SANTA CLAUS  
FOR THIS YEAR I ONLY ASK THIS OF YOU: FOR MY BROTHER TO BE HAPPY AND FOR THE OTHERS TO GET WHAT THEY WANT!_

 _SINCERELY, THE GREAT PAPYRUS  
NYEH HEH HEH!_

Frisk felt her heart melt. It was so cute! But on the other hand, now she had no wish list to go shopping from. She had to think of appropriate things to buy for everyone, and with no one other than Pap writing letters for Santa, it was a hard choice to buy good gifts.  
Frisk sighed and changed her direction to the shops. After an hour of sprinting from one place to another and buying presents for everyone, Frisk returned home with heavy bags in her hands.

She carried everything inside and took them to her room. Under her bed had enough space to contain all the gifts, so she shoved them there and made sure no one would find their place out. Frisk headed downstairs to grab a snack afterwards.

Toriel was in the kitchen. She prepared her hot cocoa as Frisk watched Sans and Papyrus's snowball fight with Undyne, Asgore and Alphys. While she sipped on her drink, she came up with a brilliant idea to surprise Sans.  
Frisk dressed up again and walked out the back door. She peeked from the corner of the walls as everyone was enjoying their time. Snowballs flew from corner to corner. She tiptoed out of her hiding spot and snuck behind a pile of snow right behind Sans, and at the right moment, she leapt into a surprise hug.

Unfortunately for her, Sans didn't take the surprise hug too warmly. To put it short, he panicked.  
Frisk's laughter paused as she felt a blue aura surround her. She was lifted from the ground and a second later she was thrown in the opposite direction. Her back collided roughly with the house's wall and her head banged against it.

Frisk's body gave out. Everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: I didn't expect this fic to receive so much feedback! Thank you for the amazing support.**

 **Enjoy. Here's chapter two.**

* * *

Sans brought his fist up to knock on the door, but he stopped halfway. Had he realized what he had done?

He stood in his place. He didn't want to go inside. Maybe Frisk didn't want to talk to him right now. Even with the show she put up, he could tell something bothered her. He dealt with this every day. He would genuinely pretend nothing was wrong, not wanting to worry others. It was easy for him to spot people playing things off.

The second Frisk woke up she tried shaking everything off with a smile. Even though she was out for only a minute, everyone grew quite worried. After seeing her so cheerful, the monsters laid off and stopped making a fuss out of what happened.  
Except for Sans.

He _hurt_ the kid.

How would he make sure this wouldn't happen again?  
He couldn't, and it was eating him up. Frisk was smiling, but behind that smirk something was bothering her.  
The child threw snowballs at everyone. The fight was on again, with snowballs flying around. Eventually, everyone went inside the house in higher spirits.

It took an hour or two for Sans to work things out for himself. And now there he was, standing at Frisk's door. He _had_ to go in.  
Sans sighed. He softly knocked on the door and waited.  
But nobody came.

"hey, kid." He started talking from the other side. Frisk might have been too upset with him to want to talk. "look, i'm sorry about what happened earlier. i didn't mean to... frisk, are you there?" Again, there was no response. The skeleton's hand rested on the door. "i'm comin' in, kiddo. hope you're not too mad at me." He pushed the door open and stepped inside.  
Frisk's room was empty. Aside from all the crumpled wrapping paper on her desk and her untidy bed, there weren't any other signs of her in the room.

Sans walked to the bed. Toriel told him earlier that after going in the house, Frisk had stayed in her room. Where could she possibly be?  
"oh jeez…" Sans was hoping he was wrong.  
Something crunched under his shoes. Looking down, he saw more wrapping paper. Decorations and ribbons were scattered around the floor, leaving a trail to under her bed. Sans got down on his knees and peeked. There were boxes shoved there. He took one out for a closer look; it was a Christmas gift from Frisk. The tag on it read Papyrus. He put it back and got up. How thoughtful of her.

His little discovery still didn't explain where the child had gone. Sans got out of the room and looked around the house. She was nowhere to be found: not with Asgore, or in Alphys' lab, or busy with Papyrus… she wasn't anywhere. He even gave himself the trouble of looking twice. No one had seen Frisk. After they had gone inside she had headed to her room and wasn't seen around.

Sans now stood outside the house in snow. Negative thoughts came clashing to him.  
Frisk wasn't anywhere around, because he had scared her away.  
Please don't let it be true. Please.

* * *

 _Earlier that day._

Frisk rummaged through her decorations box. With Christmas Eve not far away, she had to get everything ready in time.  
A sad smile rested on her lips. She screwed up so bad, didn't she? She only wanted to make Sans happy. Now she had sent everyone into panic, especially the skeleton.

Frisk hadn't heard of Sans after the incident in the yard. Remembering it, she brought a hand up to scratch her head; there was a slight bump where she had banged her head on the wall, but it wasn't serious. She upset Sans. She had to make it up to him somehow.  
He was worried. It was obvious and crystal clear to her. She was sure Sans was eating himself up for what happened. Sooner or later, he would come knocking on his door to talk to her. Frisk thought she had the best gift for him to cheer him up.

Her hands lay on the present box she had gotten for him. Frisk tiptoed to her closet and went inside. She needed a few extra things to get the presents ready. She reached for a box over her head and brought it down; it was filled with decorations. With Sans' gift in her hand, she sat down and closed the closet halfway. She didn't want to be caught in the middle of something important.

Slowly but carefully, Frisk resumed her work. After it was finally done (which took her an hour or so), she held the present close and leaned against the wall.  
All the activity had tired her. Going from shop to shop and all that fuss over the incident followed by a snowball fight had really taken her energy away from her. Frisk's eyelids felt heavier than ever. Her head tilted to one side and she fell asleep.  
Maybe taking a nap in the closet wouldn't be a bad idea. But then again, Frisk was sometimes terrible at making good choices.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Here's an early update for you guys!**

 **Seriously you're killing me with this Frozen thing XD This is NOT like Frozen.**

 **Anyway, there is still one chapter left before I finish this fic... I was planning on something short and I would like to keep it that way. Even though I don't want this story to end, I can't keep it going on forever either.**

 **Enjoy and tell me what you think!  
Btw, would you like some FriskxSans in the next chapter? I see mistletoe in distance.**

* * *

It was snowing quite heavily. Snowflakes landed on Sans' jacket, worming their way into the fabric. But he didn't mind, really. He was too busy being concerned.  
Where could Frisk have gone? With the heavy snow, it was impossible to make it a block or two away. And she was smarter than that to go out in the cold, alone and without a place to stay for the night. Maybe he had overlooked somewhere. Maybe... the child was hiding from him.

The door behind him flung open. "Sans, why are you standing in the snow? Come inside, quick." It was Toriel. She tilted her head with concern, a slight furrow on her face.  
"sorry, tori. needed some alone time." The skeleton walked inside. The butterscotch pie's smell filling the room distracted him for a moment.  
Toriel rested her hand on Sans' shoulder and stopped him from sneaking away. "Is there something concerning you?"  
"frisk wasn't in her room. have you seen her?"  
"No, but she is around, I am sure. Take a look around, will you not?"

Sans nodded and headed back upstairs. He didn't give himself the trouble of explaining he had already searched the house. Desperate, he walked to the child's room, hoping to get a clue where Frisk had gone to.

Her room was untouched. Nothing had changed. Sans quietly walked to the bed and sat on the edge. _great going,_ he thought. Frisk was hiding from him. And he was the only one to blame.  
Sans' hand brushed over something on the bed. There was a piece of paper under the pillow. Sans pulled it out; taking a closer look, it was an envelope. The backside of it read 'For Santa'.

 _i thought frisk knew this santa thing going on wasn't real..._ Curious, he opened the envelope, which he knew wasn't really right to do. But by the time he regretted his choice he had already torn the side. He shrugged. _better finish something i started._ He took the letter out and started reading it.

 _Dear Santa,  
For this year I want a tuba because today I ran out of money to buy one. I spent all my savings on buying others presents. Sorry!_

The rest of the letter continued in a very small, almost unreadable handwriting:

 _I know you're not real I'm just writing this because I didn't want to upset Papyrus. Blah blah blah... He's still eagerly waiting... Oh come on Pap isn't one request enough? Ughhh can Undyne and Alphys get together already...blah blah... more blah... oh he stopped looking_

The letter ended there. Sans chuckled slightly.  
Across the room something shuffled about in the closet. Whatever it was, it bumped against the shelf above it. Several things came crashing down from the fallen shelf and piled onto each other. "Ow!"  
Sans ran to closet. He shoved the door open and pushed everything aside from the pile of junk that was once on the shelf.

"frisk!" Sans picked the child up and took her into his embrace. "kid, you had me so worried!"

Frisk seemed baffled. She pulled out of the hug and rubbed her eyes. "I'm- I'm sorry, I think I fell asleep..." She yawned, "...in the closet. You woke me up..."  
Sans sat next to her on the wooden floor. He still felt guilty for the incident earlier. "look, kid. i need to talk to you."

Was Frisk in trouble? Had she done something wrong? Oh no, she _had_ done something wrong: she upset Sans. Frisk, ignoring her thoughts, nodded. "Yeah?"

"hey, i'm sorry for... earlier." Sans took a deep breath, " i got scared for a sec when you jumped at me... i didn't mean for it to happen. look, i get it if you don't want to talk to me. i'm sorry if i scared you."

"No, no! _I_ am sorry, I upset you so bad! I just wanted to surprise you, but I ended up scaring you! It's my fault, I shouldn't have snuck up on you like that!"

"but you didn't come out of your room for two hours, and i couldn't find you anywhere! i thought you were hiding from me..." Sans trailed off.

Frisk covered her face in both hands. "Ugh, stupid, stupid, stupid, I'm so freaking stupid!" She spat words, stomping her feet on the floor.  
"hey, kid..." Sans sat her on his lap. Frisk buried her face in his jacket and hugged him. She let out a sob.

"I'm sorry, Sans, I keep messing everything up! I'm not scared of you, I only wanted to make everyone happy but I ended up sending them in a panic, and now you think I'm upset at you!" Her sobs grew a bit louder. "You guys are the best. And I keep thinking I don't deserve this family... I keep feeling like everything's going to be taken away from me because you are the best thing that has happened to me... and I just want you guys to be happy!"

Her words baffled Sans. He sat there for a minute, trying to take in what he had heard. This was the first time he had seen her so upset. He caressed her on the cheek and wiped her tears away. "frisk," He whispered, "it's okay, kid. we love you." He kissed her on the forehead and picked her up. "and i don't want to see you upset either. i thought you got scared of me because of what happened and you didn't want to talk to me anymore. kid, you're the best thing that's happened to papyrus and i and everyone else in this house. i can never be mad at you."

He carried her to her bed and sat there with her.

"so... you wanna have a nice cream?" Sans suggested. The child nodded. Halfway out the room, Frisk stopped. "Wait here." She ran to the closet and dug something out. She came back to the skeleton with a gift and held it up for Sans to pick. "It's... I made this for you. I went in the closet to fetch some decorations for it and I fell asleep in there..." She trailed off as a bright blush appeared on her face.

It was a box, neatly wrapped in ribbons. The tag on it read 'Sans'. He ruffled her hair playfully. "thanks, kid. i'll leave it for christmas day, is that okay?"

Frisk nodded with a laugh. Sans held her hand as the two walked down the stairs. Christmas Eve was only a day or two ahead of them and well, they'd rather kick off with telling everyone they had made up.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hello readers! I apologize for taking so long to update. I am well aware that we are already through the first week of January and this fic should have been updated a long time ago, but please understand that I have been too busy recently.**

 **As for the SansxFrisk (Frans!?) I kept it as fluff. I know Frisk is just a kid and kids do not work well in shippings at all but still Frans and Alphyne are OTP :)**

 **Thank you for reading! This is the last chapter.**

* * *

"WOWIE! WAKE UP, HUMAN, IT IS CHRISTMAS MORNING! GOOD MORNING TO YOU!" Papyrus bellowed from the doorway to Frisk's room. The child groaned and pulled the sheets on her head, trying to hide from all the racket. She didn't actually care about Christmas morning; Frisk was eventually going to climb out of bed and head downstairs, so why hurry?  
"DON'T BE SUCH A LAZY BONES, HUMAN! WE HAVE GIFTS TO UNWRAP, WOULDN'T YOU LIKE TO JOIN ME, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, FOR THE OCCASION?"

"Good morning..." Frisk groaned again from her hiding place. She didn't hear the skeleton's footsteps indicating he had left. "I'll come down in five minutes...Is that okay?"  
"HUMAN, I WILL WAIT FOR YOU HERE!"  
Frisk grunted. "ALRIGHT!" With her slight snark, Papyrus closed the door behind him. Huh, how naïve and stubborn he could be! She eventually changed into her casual clothing. After getting ready for what she had to face downstairs, Frisk slowly trotted down the staircase.

In the living room, everyone was huddled together on the sofa. "Good morning!" The child greeted everyone, and went to sit by the full sofa. Toriel brought everyone a slice of her adored butterscotch pie.  
Papyrus came running inside the living room. For a change, he was dressed in proper clothing for the day; he was wearing a plain red shirt and a pair of comfortable jeans. Frisk smiled softly; he did look better in his 'battle body' than in casual wear.

And then it was time for opening presents. There was a big pile of gifts by the tree for Frisk: A neatly knit sweater from Toriel, A scarf with the words 'little cool dude' written on it in golden thread from Papyrus (obviously), a science book from Alphys, several anime dvds from Undyne, and a photo album filled with family pictures from Asgore. There was only one gift left; a big well-wrapped box that took most of the space around the Christmas tree.  
Wondering what it was, Frisk curiously opened it. What she saw left her in awe. It was a tuba, and the tag on the box read: From Sansta to Frisk.

"How did you know?!"  
Sans smiled at the child who was watching him with her mouth agape. "sansta has his ways of knowing!" The pun earned him an angry grunt from Papyrus.  
Frisk ran to the skeleton with the instrument in her hand. "I wanted a tuba so I could play it along your trombone! Can you teach me?"  
"sure, kiddo, and then we can play _incidental music_ together."  
The duo laughed. The rest of the hour was spent with everyone unwrapping their presents: Frisk had gotten Pap a cookbook, and for Sans she bought novels.  
"harry... potter?" Sans read the cover.  
"I'm pretty sure you'll like it. It's full of magic. Literally."

Their conversations was cut short with the doorbell. Undyne and Alphys had decided to pay a visit on Christmas day. Frisk gasped and ran to the two, hugging both. As Undyne left the doorstep to sit with others, she felt a slight tug on her winter coat. Frisk was pulling it gently, pointing above.  
The warrior looked at where the child was addressing to; right above their heads mistletoe was hung nicely, dangling every time the door opened. Undyne smirked. "Nah, kid."  
Frisk pulled Alphys' hand and looked expectantly at her. She brought the two close and took a step back herself. With arms crossed and a happy smile on her face, she watched the result of her actions unfold.

Undyne's smirk faded and it was replaced with a stern look. Alphys, on the other hand, was blushing like crazy. They were standing under the mistletoe. Asgore coughed meaningfully, gaining their attention. "Well?"  
Now everyone was watching them.  
This couldn't continue any longer. Undyne finally blurted out, "Nope! This is so gay!" She dismissed the situation with a wave. Alphys looked more disappointed than anything.  
"What does gay mean!?" Frisk interrupted. Alphy's blush grew bigger. Undyne laughed.  
" It's when two people of the same gender like each other." Undyne answered.  
"I like you and Alphys, does that mean I'm gay?"

"No, kid, it's a different type of liking. You'll understand when you get older."  
"B-but, what's wrong with it?" Frisk asked innocently.  
Undyne stared at the child for a moment. "Alright, alright. I don't care. But I'll keep it child-friendly only because of Toriel." She leaned down and pecked Alphys on the cheek.  
The rest of the hour was spent trying to calm Alphys down.

* * *

"Where are you going?"  
Sans was heading outside. He was just out the house when Frisk stopped him. "to grillby's, where else could would i go?"  
"Can I tag along?"

It was afternoon already. After everyone had received their gifts, they headed out to play more in the snow. Eventually, the group broke up and everyone went to visit their friends.  
"sure." Sans walked a few more steps in the snow. His footsteps weren't accompanied by Frisk's, so he stopped to look back. The child was still standing by the doorway. "what is it, is something wrong?" It better not.  
When he didn't receive a response, he walked back to the house. The child had a weird look on her face. "are you-"  
A big grin crept on Frisk's face. Sans looked at her quite confused. He tilted his head in questions. "what's... are you okay?!"  
"Hah! Look up!" Frisk jumped a bit in happiness.

Oh no.  
They were both standing under the mistletoe.  
Sans, startled, jerked backwards and clutched his jacket firmly. His face turned blue. This could go wrong in so many ways, especially thinking of the fact that the child had a tendency to flirt with everyone. Heck, she even tried to hit on Napstablook.  
He took a step back and coughed. "hey kid, you should dress up if we want to head to grillby's. and hurry-" But Frisk leaned in quickly, and softly pecked the skeleton on the cheekbone. At least this didn't go as bad as it could.

Sans calmed down. The child hugged him tightly. He wrapped a hand around her and gave a warm smile.  
"c'mon, kiddo. if we wanna catch grillby's on time we have to get going." In return, he picked her up and walked out.  
For Frisk , this had been the best Christmas she had ever experienced. It surely was for everyone. _There's no place I'd rather be,_ the child pondered while she rested her head on Sans' neck. She fell asleep to the slow rocking back and forth in his embrace.


End file.
